Zombiefied! Read Online Free

Sometimes, if he was really angry, he threw bits of chalk at people. Everyone was petrified of him.
    â€˜Ummm,’ I said, wondering why, out of all the teachers in school, it had to be Slender who caught me. I must’ve been in shock because I added, ‘That just opened.’ I pointed behind me at the back wall of the cupboard.
    â€˜What just opened?’ said Mr Slender, glaring at me.
    I glanced around. The hole was gone. There was just a solid wall.
    â€˜It was just there,’ I said, still pointing. What had happened? Where had it gone?
    â€˜Hmmm,’ said Mr Slender. ‘Your knee’s bleeding. Did you fall off your bike?’
    I was so stunned, I could barely register what he was saying. ‘There was a hole in the wall. Sort of like a doorway.’
    â€˜I’m sure there was,’ said Mr Slender in a tone that made it clear he didn’t believe me. ‘Now did you fall off your bike or not?’
    â€˜Yeah, but I’m OK.’ I stared back where the hole had been. ‘It’s just that this hole . . . it wasn’t there, and then it appeared.’
    â€˜You sound confused.’ Mr Slender peered at me. ‘Did you hit your head in the fall?’
    â€˜Yeah — I mean no.’ I suddenly felt confused.
    â€˜There is no hole. Look.’ He gestured toward the wall. ‘And as for things that appear out of nowhere, well, I’ve never heard anything stupider in my life. Now I think you’d better go wash your knee, then head straight to class. And I want to see you in my classroom after school so you can catch up on all the work you’ve already missed.’
    Detention! That was so unfair! People always arrived late to the first class of the day, so it’s not like I would have missed anything important!
    â€˜Off you go,’ snapped Mr Slender. ‘This storeroom is out of bounds. If I catch you in here again, it’ll be detention for a week.’
    I shot one more look at the wall, then grabbed my bag off the floor. I walked past Mr Slender into the toilets and gave my knee a quick rinse under the tap. The water was icy cold, but I hardly felt it.
    Outside the bathroom, the hallway was completely deserted — except for Slender, who stood with his arms folded in front of the janitor’s storeroom. Now the door was shut, the panel blended in so well with the ones alongside it that it took me a second to work out which one had opened. I headed toward my English class in a stateof disbelief. What had I just seen? Had a secret passageway really just opened up under the stairs? And if there was a secret passageway, where did it lead?

7
    By lunchtime, I’d simmered down a bit. I was still pretty angry at Sophie, but I really wanted to tell her about what I’d discovered. Still, I wasn’t going to let her off the hook that easily. During English I’d sat at the front while she went straight to our usual spot at the back of the room. All the way through class, she kept throwing notes at me:

    Sarah was the only girl in our year who Sophie occasionally hung out with. Sarah spent most of her time in the library, so ‘hanging out’ with her meant sitting beside her, reading a book. Not exactly my idea of fun.
    I wrote a note and threw it back at her.

    During lunch I hung around the hallway entrance alone, watching the janitor’s storeroom. I was waiting for the hallway to clear; I didn’t want anyone nearby while I was checking out the storeroom again. If there was a secret passageway, I wanted to be the first to explore it.
    It wasn’t until the bell rang, and the last classroom door banged shut, that the corridor was empty. But just as I was aboutto step into the hallway, Mr Slender appeared again.
    â€˜Still hanging around out here?’ he asked, striding toward me.
    â€˜I was just getting some books out of my locker,’ I lied, relieved I happened to be standing near it. I opened my